representations of transylvania in the …upm.ro/cci/cci-04/lit/lit 04 64.pdf · century...
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Iulian Boldea, Dumitru-Mircea Buda (Editors) CONVERGENT DISCOURSES. Exploring the Contexts of Communication Arhipelag XXI Press, Tîrgu Mureș, 2016 ISBN: 978-606-8624-17-4 Section: Literature
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REPRESENTATIONS OF TRANSYLVANIA IN THE 21ST-CENTURY BELLES-LETTRES
Júlia Anna Makkai
PhD Student, ”Babeș-Bolyai” University of Cluj-Napoca
Abstract: The Hungarian book market has offered increasingly popular belles-lettres products in the
last years, which have played an important part in forming an opinion about the region by creating and
shaping an image, an identity, brand value. From a medial point of view, belles-lettres represent
important components of the given community, in our case, components of the Transylvanian Hungarian
and Hungarian society’s “authentic knowledge”. My research aims to gather those components of the
collective imagination that are related to Transylvania. I intend to point out how some elements of the
collective memory related to Transylvania are presented and “updated” in a text (György Dragomán:
Máglya. Magvető kiadó, Budapest, 2014). I will categorize these symbolic meanings related to the
region according to a specific methodology, since these categories are applicable in comparing more
novels: time structure, space structure, demographic data, text surface, resources, stereotypes and
myths about the Transylvanian past.
Keywords: Transylvania, representations, collective imagination, memory, symbolic meanings.
Representations of Transylvania in the 21st-Century Belles-Lettres
This research aims to gather those components of the collective imagination1 that are related
to Transylvania. I basically intend to categorize through a specific method the symbolic
meanings about the region which create and shape our collective experience about the area. I
will excerpt passages from György Dragomán’s novel Máglya (The Bone Fire), which contain
direct references to the region, and I will analyse the topoi and narrative stereotypes they are
embedded into.
The Hungarian book market has offered increasingly popular belles-lettres products in the
last years, which have played an important part in forming an opinion about the region by
creating and shaping an image, an identity, brand value. Hence, I have become interested in
what the books were teaching about the space. My intention is neither conducting an in-depth
stylistic analysis, nor demonstrating that Transylvania attracts a greater interest on the book
market. I shall analyse the Transylvania-image in the novel, through methods appropriate for
comparing more than one novels.
György Dragomán is a Transylvania-born writer and translator, who lives in Budapest, and
has received a József Attila-prize. He has lived in the communist Romania, in Târgu-Mureş
1 György Péter: Állatkert Kolozsváron – Képzelt Erdély. 7–8.
Iulian Boldea, Dumitru-Mircea Buda (Editors) CONVERGENT DISCOURSES. Exploring the Contexts of Communication Arhipelag XXI Press, Tîrgu Mureș, 2016 ISBN: 978-606-8624-17-4 Section: Literature
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until the age of 15. His family moved to Hungary in 1988. His second novel, A fehér király
(The White King) has already been translated to more than 30 languages worldwide.2 His novel
evokes Romania in the ‘80s, and it has a British movie adaptation too, first screened during the
70th Edinburgh International Film Festival (EIFF).3 His third novel, Máglya (The Bone Fire)
has been named “the most anticipated novel of 2014” by the KönyvesBlog, an internet blog
intended for popularizing books and reading. In the novel, a 13-year old girl, Emma recalls the
period of the ’89 Romanian revolution, the regime change. She loses her parents to tragic
circumstances, she is raised by her grandmother, who practices quotidian magic and its rituals.
In the novel, the grandmother bears a strong magical code, she creates the mythical space
outlined in the novel. Dargomán’s novel is an eminent contemporary Hungarian example of the
magical realism, and it is also an outstanding representative prosaist of the contemporary
Hungarian literature’s flourishing historicist narrative. The author is a member of a writer
generation that presents the Central-Eastern European affliction through survival stories.4
In my paper, I have gathered the components objectifying the region through a specific
analysis model, components which are suitable for comparing more novels, e. g. time structure
(the time narrated, the time-space relationship), space structure (urban-rural character, values
and meanings of spaces, built environment, scenes characterized as being typically
Transylvanian, civilizational landscape components – economy, culture, politics, gastronomy),
demographic data (distribution of ethnic groups, social class, age and occupational categories),
text surface (language, style, linguistic particularities, layers and linguistic markers), layers of
knowledge, attitudes, resources, stereotypes and myths about the Transylvanian past.
The term representation, well-known from social psychology, and the researches about
collective imagination have been the launching points of shaping the model for
analysis.5Representations mean reality contents which interact with our perception about the
worlds. They make past events and fictional reality visible and comprehensible. In the
interrelationship between reality and its image, the image can take over reality’s place, it can
replace the latter or even create a “reality” that only exists in the representation.6
2György Dragomán’s site, source: http://gyorgydragoman.com/?page_id=5, downloaded: March 12, 2016. 3KönyvesBlog.hu, source:
http://konyves.blog.hu/2016/06/20/a_feher_kiraly_megmutatja_milyen_borzaszto_tud_lenni_a_valo_vilag,
downloaded: July 1, 2016. 4 Németh Zoltán: Mágikus realizmus a magyar irodalomban (Tér, idő, név és posztmodernizmus). 70. 5 Arjun Appadurai: A lokalitás teremtése. 3–32.; Bronislaw Baczko: Les Imaginaires sociaux. Mémoires et espoirs
collectifs; Charles Taylor: Modern Social Imaginaries; Cornelius Castoriardis: L’istitution imaginaire de la
société; Dominique Kalifa: Les bas-fonds. Histoire d’une imaginaire. Feischmit Margit: A magyar nacionalizmus
autenticitásdiskurzusainak szimbolikus térfoglalása Erdélyben. Hanna Pitkin: The Concept of Representation;
Katja Valaskivi – Johanna Sumilaia: Circulating Social Imagineries. Theoretical and Methodological Reflections.
Marc Augé: Non-lieux. Introduction à une anthropologie de la surmodernité; Saadi Lahlou – Jean-Claude Abric:
What are the „elements” of social representations?; Serge Moscovici: Theory of social representations. 6 Terestyéni Tamás: Szövegelméleti tézisek. (A reprezentáció, a kommunikatív cselekvés és az informativitás
szempontjai szövegek vizsgálatában.); Paul Ricoeur: Critique and Conviction.
Iulian Boldea, Dumitru-Mircea Buda (Editors) CONVERGENT DISCOURSES. Exploring the Contexts of Communication Arhipelag XXI Press, Tîrgu Mureș, 2016 ISBN: 978-606-8624-17-4 Section: Literature
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These reality contents are artificial and constructed, created and distributed by the producers
of the culture industry through different mediums (press, folk art, belles-lettres, different forms
of visual contents: painting, film, photography, etc.).
The sources of the constructed contents are memory, heritage and identity, which is
explained as “broad present” or presentism by historians. It can manifest as focusing on an
area’s cultural heritage, in which the social practices of salvage and preservation become
prominent. In his book, Regimes of Historicity: Presentism and Experiences of Time, the
French historian François Hartog explains this phenomenon through the events of September
11., which happens and becomes visible simultaneously, it remembers itself through the
cameras.7
The significant role of the media in producing representations can be sensed in this
statement: the media, with the expansion of newspapers, radio and television participates in
producing events. The present acts as historical from the very moment of its formation, it
appears as past.8Tourism is a strong bearer of presentism: the entire world comes in reach,
through its “filter”, different slices of the past become interesting.9
Hartog assigns three keywords to the concept of broad present, which are also its criteria:
memory, which can be either intentional (oral history) or reconstructed (written history),
heritage (its salvage, focusing on its value, its fostering) and commemoration. These three point
at the fourth, or this fourth can be the basis of these three: identity.
The way we perceive past is shaped by several “presentational elements”, like advertising
mediums (booklets, boards etc.) intended for information and popularizing historical memories,
the explanations of guides or restoration and creation of monuments.10
Grasping, highlighting and showing different slices of the past is also specific to belles-
lettres, not only to media and tourism. My research presents belles-lettres as media product,
since from a medial point of view, it bears several relevant components of a community, in our
case, of the Transylvanian Hungarian and the Hungarian society’s “authentic knowledge”. I
will analyse components of Hartog’s keywords in György Dragomán’s novel, the ones that are
presented and “updated” in a text.
In the contemporary so-called Transylvania-novels of the historicist trend in the Hungarian
prose and the structures that recall historical moments or are based on these, the use of historical
scenery is common, and also, emphasizing the historical events of the past. Also, there is a
strand of prosaists which is formed of a writer generation that evokes the print of the recent
past, or a certain Central-Eastern European tribulation and survival stories generated by the fear
and vulnerability caused by the nature of dictatorships. A prominent representative is György
Dragomán, who has personal experience about the historical time and scenery of his works, the
fictional elements are built upon historical basis.
7 François Hartog: A történetiség rendjei – Prezentizmus és időtapasztalat. 20. 8 Hartog, 115. 9 Hartog, 114. 10 Hartog, 90.
Iulian Boldea, Dumitru-Mircea Buda (Editors) CONVERGENT DISCOURSES. Exploring the Contexts of Communication Arhipelag XXI Press, Tîrgu Mureș, 2016 ISBN: 978-606-8624-17-4 Section: Literature
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György Dragomán’s second novel, Máglya (The Bone Fire) was published in 2014 by
Magvető Publishing. The author illustrates the period of the Romanian regime change, the
events of the past, the losses of the individual, the development of identity, through the duality
of magic and reality. We follow a thirteen years old girl, Emma for a year: her parents die in a
car crash, so her grandmother takes her in. The action of the novel is set in a mythical space.
The child’s perspective (the events seen through the little girl’s eyes) and the magic that can be
sensed through the entire novel create beliefs that are different than the ordinary. The author
evokes the period of the revolution of 1989 in Romania through a narrative technique that
focuses on the past, specific to post-modern literature, and through magic realism. The attempt
to process the past as a community and to understand the historical grievances mark a
contemporary Central-Eastern European literary tendency.11 My aim is to identify the sources
of the constructed components of handling the past, and also, the representation contents created
by the space opposition between magic and reality. Hereinafter, I will examine the apparatus
and the genre features of magic realism that created the mythical Central European region with
focus on the components of the mythical space created by the author.
The mythicising function of magic realism
Facing history as a postmodern feature and narrating the past characterize the shift of
paradigm in social sciences, the most relevant product – besides the appearance of
historiographic metafiction – is the magic realistic novel. In contrast with modernism’s
cognition focused interests (epistemology), the postmodern writing concentrates on the
philosophical teachings about existence, the most general laws of existence (ontology). This
consists a basis for magic realistic novels’ self-reflexive metafictional writing, in which
language does not intend to primarily influence reality, but to magically transform it.
Magic realistic prose has played an important part in the Hungarian literature since the
1980s, its forerunner was Miklós Mészöly’s Volt egyszer egy Közép-Európa (Once There Was
a Central Europe), a collection of short stories presenting the Central European area. These
stories were the first to point out that the Hungarian magic realistic novels, in contrast to Gabriel
Garcia Marquez’s Latin American magic realistic novels’ specific irrational Latin American
sceneries, follow a unique topography: “an irrational space, set in the past, multi-cultural, mixed
cultural, and hybrid.”12
In magic realistic texts, one can often sense the intertwining of a magical, transcendental and
a realistic, rational space opposition. The essence of this is that the magical, supernatural space
is not only created, but it also acts as if it were part of the reality, and not an opposing dimension.
The purpose of using the supernatural element is a new, unique, mythicising way of interpreting
the world and discussing about the world. A specific thematic element is remembering and
11 Gyeskó Ágnes: Dragomán György – Máglya. Oktatási segédanyag. 12 „egy múltbeli, multikulturális, illetve kevert kultúrájú, hibrid, irracionális teret”. Németh, 70.
Iulian Boldea, Dumitru-Mircea Buda (Editors) CONVERGENT DISCOURSES. Exploring the Contexts of Communication Arhipelag XXI Press, Tîrgu Mureș, 2016 ISBN: 978-606-8624-17-4 Section: Literature
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recalling the past, often in order to relive ideological and social conflicts, which can be
interpreted as a way of processing traumas.13
Narratives which “Have become a separate trend among the genre of magic realism. The
Hungarian magic realistic proseoutside the territory of Hungary – often born in mixed culture
mediums – consists a specific strand of Hungarian speaking magic realism, due to its specific
notion of space and time. György Dragomán’s book is a representative of this trend.14
The speaking devices of the author and narrative techniques
In the writings of György Dragomán and other, also postmodern authors’ (like Andrea
Tompa’s) works, the reader can observe several autobiographic elements, especially knowing
data like the age, the life story of the main characters and the writers themselves. Just like
Andrea Tompa, Dragomán also left his native city, Târgu-Mureş at the age of fifteen and
relocated to Hungary in 1988. However, in the main themes of his novels „the biographic
approach is not the most accentuated. The methods of narration and evocation are primarily
based on the reactions of the characters; they reach the peak of their narrative effect through
these.”
Fragmented, raconteur storytelling characterizes his work, and also, metafiction, blurring the
lines between real and unreal, and historicity consolidates the stories (i.e. the historical themes).
The stories show a kind of Eastern European, Balkan polychrome of the multicultural
environment, a linguistic and cultural heterogeneity.
The specific voice the writer uses, characterized by strong body perception, and conveying
emotions and sensual experiences is compared to the voice of Péter Nádas in the Hungarian
literature, according to the critics.15 He goes into spectacular details to present through Emma’s
imagination as she climbs up a firewall without plaster:
“I reach up stretching, stroking the wall, seeking grip. As soon as I find it, I feel as if I kick
myself away from the ground, if I just let my fingers reach between the cracks, my body would
know the rest. My arms would pull, my calves would push, my toes would find the props, I
would cling against the wall, I would crawl up, flawlessly and swiftly as quicksilver.”16
The location and time of the act appear implicitly: the story happens after the revolution of
1989, in Romania, during the downfall of the dictatorship, supposedly in Târgu-Mureş, the
writer’s home town (or at least, in the beginning of the story). The author intentionally blurs
the specifics of space and time, however, not so much as to make it applicable to a general kind
13 Németh, 70–72. 14 „a közelmúlt történelmének közös, kelet-európainak mondható nyomorúságát és az ebből fakadó identitásokat,
vagy a diktatúrák természetrajzából adódóan a félelem és kiszolgáltatottság által generált túlélés-történeteket
konkretizáló tér-időben jelenítenek meg.” Németh, 70. 15 Kolozsi Orsolya: Az átmenet(ek) nehézségei (Dragomán György: Máglya című regényéről). 2015. 16 „Felnyújtózom, tapogatózva simogatom a falat, fogást keresek. Amikor találok, azt érzem, hogy csak fel kéne
rúgnom magam a földtől, csak neki kéne tapasszam magam a falnak, csak hagynom kéne, hogy az ujjaim
befurakodjanak a repedésekbe, és a testem már tudná is a többit. A karom húzna és a vádlim lökne, a lábujjaim
megtalálnák a támasztópontokat, a falhoz simulnék, felkúsznék rajta, folyékonyan és gyorsan, mint a higany”
(Dragomán György: Máglya.127.)
Iulian Boldea, Dumitru-Mircea Buda (Editors) CONVERGENT DISCOURSES. Exploring the Contexts of Communication Arhipelag XXI Press, Tîrgu Mureș, 2016 ISBN: 978-606-8624-17-4 Section: Literature
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of dictatorship. A very overt sign is the scene in which they burn the picture of the dictator, and
also, the words that refer to the region: motorina, szukk, pionír, málnás szukk, blokkház,
apartament, kalorifer, borkán, szeku etc. (diesel, soda, pioneer, raspberry soda, block,
apartment, radiator, jar, Securitate – Romanian loan words). The novel does not intend to
present the past and the change of regime with historical accuracy (instead of General Secretary,
he intentionally uses the word “general”). In spite of going into specifics of the world he
presents, while the story seems to stagnate in an empty dimensionless space, the death of the
dictator has already happened, but there is no new ruling system. The bedimming of the
situational elements of time and space is a device of creating the mythical space. The narrative
techniques like secrets, suggestions, the lyrical vagueness serve for creating magical
atmosphere. We become acquainted with the former life of the two main characters gradually.
The grandmother and the granddaughter are tied through a dead woman: Emma’s mother, the
grandmother’s only daughter. However, bit by bit, we find out why the relationship between
the grandmother and her daughter was interrupted, why they did not speak with each other and
why the grandmother never saw her granddaughter.17
“While we eat, suddenly she asks me if my mother has really never ever told me anything
about her. Not a word, ever? Not about her, not about Grandpa? The chestnut halts in my hand,
I can hardly speak, but eventually, I tell her “no”. It seems as if the wrinkles deepened on
Grandma’s face, she nods. I ask her what they fought about. As soon as I utter the words, I
know I shouldn’t have. (…) She tells me I have the right to know, and I would know, of course,
she would tell me eventually, but let’s not ruin the chestnuts.”18
The generalisation and abstraction of the situational elements of the novel are specific to the
relativizing prose poetics.19 The evoking narrative proceeds from the general to the direction of
the concrete, and synchronized with this, a tragic reference system from the general to the
concrete space and time also starts to operate.
Time
Besides processing the past, another main feature of magic realism is the search for identity
and self-determination, and in order to do so, the author uses remembering as a device. The
novel’s dilemma is the search for identity and the re-creation of identity by Emma and the
community. Hence, Dragomán’s novel is built on the narrative of remembering, thisis the main
driving force, the motive. In Francois Hartog’s terms, this can be considered an intentional
memory, a kind of oral history. The memories are partly personal, like Emma’s memories of
17 Kolozsi 2015. 18 „Ahogy eszünk, egyszer csak azt kérdezi, hogy tényleg soha, de soha nem mesélt őróla semmit nekem az
édesanyám? Egy szót se, soha? Róla se, és Nagyapáról se? Megáll a kezemben a gesztenye, nehezen szólalok meg,
de aztán mégis azt mondom, hogy nem. Nagymama arcán mintha elmélyülnek a ráncok, bólint. Megkérdezem,
min vesztek össze. Még ki se mondom, már tudom, hogy nem kellett volna. (...) Azt mondja, jogom van tudni, és
meg is fogom majd tudni, persze, el fogja majd nekem mondani, de nem most, ne rontsuk el a gesztenyeevést”
(Dragomán, 95.) 19 Németh, 71.
Iulian Boldea, Dumitru-Mircea Buda (Editors) CONVERGENT DISCOURSES. Exploring the Contexts of Communication Arhipelag XXI Press, Tîrgu Mureș, 2016 ISBN: 978-606-8624-17-4 Section: Literature
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her parents, and some are collective about the past of the city and the country. These two
registers can be separated, but they are strongly linked, since the family’s past, which follows
the main character through her life, is the metaphor of the collective remembrance.20
Remembrance starts from personal memories, often triggered by an object or a situation, but in
each case, the author associates it with a collective content. The stories are typically traumatic,
inherited or experienced. E.g. the athletics teacher, Mr. Pali’s personal memory of Emma’s
grandfather, who was not a snitch.
“(…) people are stupid, they didn’t know my grandpa well. He did, though, since they had
been 20, from the hippodrome (…). He was a straightforward man, he had only once been
disappointed in him, when my grandpa borrowed his old military map, the most detailed and
accurate map ever of the mountains, and he dared to die without giving it back. You can’t find
a map like this anymore, because communists hate maps, they intentionally drew them wrong.
(…) He never was a snitch. (…) My grandpa was a hero, he went through the war, captivity,
concentration camp, re-education camp, he withstood everything, including the fact that they
wanted to make him a scavenger, despite being a surgeon.”21
The memory of the classmate, Krisztina, of the fusillade that killed her sister:
“They are standing there, clinging to each other, everyone is running around them, but they
can’t move, they just hold each other, when she suddenly feels that Réka is pulled away from
her arms, something pulls her, lifts her and throws her away, and in the next second, Réka
already lies on the cobblestone, her coat is full of blood, her face is full of blood, her hair is full
of blood, and she is standing above her sister, grabbing her wrist with two hands, pulling and
jerking her, she tries to lift her, she tries to pull her up, come on, move, stand up, live, but all in
vain, Réka does not move.”22
In order to evoke memories, the author uses magic motifs, like the repeated appearance of
ants, a motif that symbolizes putting the pieces together, correcting something. The way the
ants put the torn leaf together, Emma also tries to piece the details of her past together. The
grandmother fights forgetting with images drawn in the flour.
20 Gyeskó 2015. 21 „(...) az emberek hülyék, nem ismerték rendesen nagyapámat. Ő viszont ismerte, húszéves kora óta, még a
lovardából (...). Egyenes ember volt mindig, csak egy dologban csalódott benne az életben, abban, hogy nagyapám
elkérte tőle a régi katonai térképet, aminél részletesebb meg pontosabb soha nem készült ezekről a hegyekről, és
képes volt úgy meghalni, hogy nem adta vissza. Ilyen térképet nem lehet sehol szerezni, mert a kommunisták, azok
utálják a térképeket, direkt félrerajzolták az összeset. (...) Soha nem volt besúgó. (...) A nagyapám egy hős volt,
végig csinálta a háborút, a hadifogságot, a munkatábort, az átnevelőtábort, azt, hogy sebész létére utcaseprőt
akartak csinálni belőle, mindent kibírt (...)” (Dragomán, 108.) 22 „Állnak és egymásba kapaszkodnak, mindenki rohan körülöttük, de ők nem tudnak megmozdulni, szorítják és
ölelik egymást, és akkor egyszer csak azt érzi, hogy Rékát hirtelen kirántja a karjából valami, kirántja, felemeli,
elhajítja, és a következő pillanatban Réka már ott fekszik a kockaköveken, tiszta vér a füsskabátja, tiszta vér az
arca, tiszta vér a haja, ő ott áll a testvére fölött, két kézzel a két csuklóját fogja, húzza, rángatja, fel akarja emelni,
fel akarja rántani a földről, hogy jöjjön, keljen fel, álljon fel, éljen, de hiába, Réka nem mozdul (...).” (Dragomán,
374.)
Iulian Boldea, Dumitru-Mircea Buda (Editors) CONVERGENT DISCOURSES. Exploring the Contexts of Communication Arhipelag XXI Press, Tîrgu Mureș, 2016 ISBN: 978-606-8624-17-4 Section: Literature
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“She charges the board, her ring clicks on the wooden brim under the table, and a wave runs
through the flour, the faces disappear, the surface is flat again. Grandma tells me that for my
information, forgetting is hard. I might think that I would never forget anything, that I would
always remember everything, but it wouldn’t be so. One can forget even the most important
things, the best things, the worst things, the greatest pain and the greatest happiness, everything,
everything. She looks into my eyes and tells me that forgetting is like a curse that burdens
everybody, even me, even her, but hers is heavier now.”23
Two metaphors of remembrance as interpreting self-determination are: looking for the
origins and the purification of the individual, which also serve the mythic atmosphere. the
search for the origins24 manifests itself by the fact that Emma’s every skill is inherited from her
parents. In drawing class, she remembers her father, whom she often watched painting: “In my
old school, I never managed to draw cubes and apples and walnuts. (…) I remember father as
he would work with the brush and the scraper blade, and I would watch him a lot working.”25
In the library, the librarian compares her to her mother: “She tells me that she knows who I am,
just as if she was looking at my mother, just as if my mother was standing in front of her, but
of course, I also look like me father too.”26 The metaphor of purification and liberation27 is also
present, through the main character’s speaking out as a narrative technique.
For the religious person, neither space nor time are homogenous: there are sacred periods,
the periods of holidays, and there are profane time intervals. Rites help us transition from one
to another. Sacred time is saturated with existence, real time, when something really “happens”:
“by its very nature sacred time is reversible in the sense that properly speaking it is a primordial
mythical time made present.”28 The religious person’s relationship to time is defined by their
longing for existence, they flee the present, which is but a momentary transition: the religious
man “refuses to live solely in what, in modem terms, is called the historical present; he attempts
to regain a sacred time that, from one point of view, can be homologized to eternity.”29
The sacred time is the time of the origin, the man strives to get in its closeness. He attempts
to be rejuvenated through returning to the original time: “Since the sacred and strong time is
23 „Meglöki a deszkát, a gyűrűje nekikoppan az asztal szélén átnyúló alsó faperemnek, hullám fut végig tőle a
liszten, az arcok eltűnnek, a liszt megint sima. Nagymama azt mondja, tudjam meg, hogy felejteni könnyű. Lehet,
hogy azt hiszem, hogy én soha semmit se fogok elfelejteni, mindig és mindenre emlékezni fogok, de nem így lesz.
Még a legfontosabb dolgokat is el lehet felejteni, a legjobb dolgokat és a legrosszabb dolgokat, a legnagyobb
fájdalmat és a legnagyobb örömöt, mindent, mindent. A szemembe néz, azt mondja, a felejtés olyan, mint egy
átok, amelyik ott ül mindenkinek a vállán, az enyémen is, az övén is, csak az övén már sokkal súlyosabban”
(Dragomán, 77.) 24 Kolozsi 2015. 25 „A régi iskolámban nem sikerült soha lerajzolni a kockákat meg az almákat meg a diókat. (...) Apa jut eszembe,
ahogy az ecsettel és a vakarókéssel dolgozott, hogy milyen sokat néztem munka közben (...)” (Dragomán, 159.) 26 „(...) azt mondja, tudja, ki vagyok, ahogy meglátott, rögtön tudta, ezer közül is megismerne, pont mintha anyámat
látná, pont mintha ő állna előtte, és persze apámra is hasonlítok (...)” (Dragomán, 173.) 27 Kolozsi 2015. 28 Mircea Eliade: The Sacred and the Profane. The Nature of Religion. 68. 29 Eliade, 71.
Iulian Boldea, Dumitru-Mircea Buda (Editors) CONVERGENT DISCOURSES. Exploring the Contexts of Communication Arhipelag XXI Press, Tîrgu Mureș, 2016 ISBN: 978-606-8624-17-4 Section: Literature
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the time of origins, the stupendous instant in which a reality was created, was for the first time
fully manifested, man will seek periodically to return to that original time. This ritual
reactualizing of the illud tempus in which the first epiphany of a reality occurred is the basis
for all sacred calendars; the festival is not merely the commemoration of a mythical (and hence
religious) event; it reactualizes the event.”30
The sweeping character of the experiences signal the constant formation of Emma’s identity
and freedom.31 The teachers’ opinions about freedom and responsibility are expressed in the art
teacher’s monologue:
“He personally risked his life to stop stupid people from giving everyone stupid orders, but
if we wanted to be stupid intentionally, then just go for it. Then we deserve to have them sit on
our necks again, and if the old system returns, it would be on us. It would be our own
fault.”32
Krisztina’s story, the first love:
“I remember Iván’s face, the way he smiled when Krisztina pulled him in the water, I knew
he would never be mine. So be it. Let him be Krisztina’s.”33 Péter: “I’m thinking about Péter
while doing the dishes, I can’t not think about him. (…) He tells me that first love is always
painful. Painful and hard, but that’s what makes it beautiful. He asks me, is this a serious boy?
Maybe, I tell him nodding.”34
The experience of menstruation:
“In the dawn, Grandma catches me trying to clean the sheet and my sleeping gown. The
sheet is bloody, the sleeping gown is bloody. I bled on them. I am very ashamed. I scrub them
with the washing soap in vain, I thrash them against the side of the bathing tub in vain, the
blood won’t come out. (…) It’s not deep red anymore, but it’s become larges, like a red bird
with spread wings. (…) After breakfast, Grandma tells me she’s proud of me, because I’ve
become a big girl.”35
Emma needs strong experiences to make her mature.
30 Eliade, 81. 31 Malek Ízisz: A múlt fogságában – Dragomán György: Máglya. 32 „Ő személy szerint azért kockáztatta az életét, hogy ne hülyék parancsoljanak mindenkinek hülyeségeket, de ha
mi magunktól akarunk hülyék lenni, akkor úgy kell nekünk. Akkor megérdemeljük majd, hogy megint a
nyakunkba üljenek, és ha megint az lesz itt, ami régen volt, azt magunknak köszönhetjük. A mi hibánk lesz”
(Dragomán, 368.) 33 „Iván arca jut eszembe, ahogy mosolygott, amikor Krisztina berántotta a vízbe, tudom, hogy soha nem lesz az
enyém. Akkor nem is kell. Legyen a Krisztináé” (Dragomán, 270.) 34 Péter: „Mosogatás közben Péterre gondolok, nem tudok nem rá gondolni. (...) Azt mondja, tudjam meg, az igazi
szerelem, az mindig fájdalmas. Fájdalmas is, nehéz is, de pont attól szép. Azt kérdezi, ez most egy komolyabb fiú?
Lehet, mondom, bólintok (...)” (Dragomán, 285.) 35 „Nagymama rajtakap hajnalban, amikor megpróbálom kimosni a lepedőt és a hálóingemet. A hálóing véres,a
lepedő is véres. Én véreztem össze. Nagyon szégyellem. Hiába dörzsölöm mosószappannal, hiába csapkodom a
kád széléhez, a vérfolt nem jön ki. (...) Már nem olyan mélyvörös, de nagyobb lett, olyan, mint egy kiterjesztett
szárnyú piros madár. (...) Reggeli után Nagymama azt mondja, büszke rám, hogy már nagylány vagyok (...)”
(Dragomán, 111.)
Iulian Boldea, Dumitru-Mircea Buda (Editors) CONVERGENT DISCOURSES. Exploring the Contexts of Communication Arhipelag XXI Press, Tîrgu Mureș, 2016 ISBN: 978-606-8624-17-4 Section: Literature
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Space
Mythical space is basically organized by two systems: the transcendental belief system and
the child’s perspective, through which the author shows the events of the past and the strand of
events in the novel.
The essence of magic realism is the presence of the transcendental belief system, which is
created by the opposition of the sacred and the profane space. Mircea Eliade analyses the nature
of the sacred and the profane space in his work The Sacred and the Profane, and also, the
mythicising power of the opposition of these two existential situations. For the non-religious
man, every space is homogeneous, in contrast, the saint, sacred space is nonhomogeneous, it
has additional meanings. Eliade gives the example of the threshold of the church and the house:
the door leading into the church interrupts the continuity of space, the upward threshold
between the two locations indicates the gap between profane and religious, these two
existences, and the passing of the frontier is associated with rituals. Every sacred space is related
to a hierophany (something becoming sacred, the manifestation of the sacred). The sacred enters
the profane existence, it cracks the profane space, and hence, by making its “ceiling” open, it
consecrates it. The sanctity of the space is usually signalled: “(…) the sign, fraught with
religious meaning, introduces an absolute element and puts an end to relativity and confusion.
Something that does not belong to this world has manifested itself apodictically and in so doing
has indicated an orientation or determined a course of conduct.”36
In Dragomán’s story, the magical code is represented by the Grandmother, whose person is
defined solely bysuperstitions and beliefs. The Grandmother sees the dead, she bodes, she
makes a golem, she senses and causes things opposing the everyday reality. “I look up on his
face, on Grandma’s finger marks. His face is scary, I want to let go of his arm, but I don’t dare.
(…) This is just a clay man; his name is Bone-of-the-Earth. He will be our servant, he will live
in the wood shed, we summoned him to protect us.”37 According to the critics, this makes her
anincreasingly unilateral character. We know nothing of the Grandmother’s social embedding,
about her relationships besides her granddaughter, she appears as being outside of society. By
the end of the novel we find out that she “snitched” in the past regime. These rituals usually
serve remembrance on one hand, and on the other, they try to find some kind of solution or
answer for the questions. The beliefs and superstitions are inherited from the ancient and
folkloric Hungarian culture, they are relics, with a function to express identity in many 20th-
century and contemporary literary products.38 The existence of magical elements is not
questioned or explained, just accepted naturally by the characters.
36 Eliade, 27. 37 „Felnézek az arcára, Nagymama ujjainak a nyomára. Az arc félelmetes, el akarom engedni a karját, de nem
merem. (...) Ez csak egy agyagember, úgy hívják, Földcsontja. A szolgánk lesz,a fáskamrában fog lakni, azért
hívtuk, hogy vigyázzon ránk” (Dragomán, 335.) 38 Keszeg Vilmos: Hiedelmek, narrativumok, strategiak; Czegenyi Dora Andrea: Az „arnyek nelkuli” hiedelem.
Fogalomtorteneti attekintes. 1–45.
Iulian Boldea, Dumitru-Mircea Buda (Editors) CONVERGENT DISCOURSES. Exploring the Contexts of Communication Arhipelag XXI Press, Tîrgu Mureș, 2016 ISBN: 978-606-8624-17-4 Section: Literature
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The aim of the religious man is to live in the sacred. This need leads him to form orientation
techniques that basically serve the creation of the sacred space.39 To the religious man, the
habitat is a happening saturated with existence, guaranteed by the deities: “(…) habitation
always undergoes a process of sanctification, because it constitutes an imago mundi and the
world is a divine creation.”40
The initiation, the death, the mythical ecstasy, absolute knowledge and belief symbolize the
transition from one existence to the other. Hence, we can interpret the novel as an initiation
story, the function of the rites can be initiation into real life. E.g. Grandmother teaches various
things to Emma to prepare her to get along on her own after Grandmother passes away. Emma
often notes that she does something the same way her Grandmother used to do it, as she
gradually learns the rules of the adult world:
“I know everything Grandma used to know, I know everything about everybody, or at least
I can lie to myself that I do. I know that if I want, I could just pull the hairpin out of my hair
and shove it through my palm, then I can put my palm on my heart and wish for Diszkosz
Gyurka’s heart to stop. I know that if I want (…) them all to fall to their knees and apologize
for what they’ve done.”41
The elements of the space are incomplete, the description of the environment is harsh:
“The train passes by a huge plant, in the background, a block is built, among the buildings,
the cranes still stand, and behind the windows, as if huge fires were burning. Grandma looks
out, she says this is the new iron foundry block. (…) It’s cold outside, with only one streetlamp
lit, where the overpass goes between the rails. It’s hard to pull the suitcase up on the slippery
iron stairs, Grandma helps me. As we arrive on the top, I look through the wailing. The train
station is huge, goods trains are station on fifteen or more tracks. (…) We pass through the
station, on the giant clock above the exit, the hands are missing, before exiting, I peek on my
new watch, it’s midnight in seven minutes.”42
The emphasis is on the actions, reactions of the characters:
“(…) She puts her arms around me, I want to say I’m not sleepy, but before I could speak, I
feel that I actually am, I shut my eyes, I put my head on Grandma’s nutria fur collar, my nostrils
39 Eliade, 27. 40 Eliade, 52. 41 „Tudok mindent, amit Nagymama tudott, tudok mindent mindenkiről, vagy legalábbis azt tudom hazudni
magamnak. Tudom, hogy ha akarom, kikaphatom a hajtűt a hajaból, és átdöfhetem a tenyeremet, és a tenyerem
aztán a szívemre szoríthatom, és azt kívánhatom, hogy Diszkosz Gyurka szíve álljon meg. Tudom, hogy ha
akarom, (...) hogy mind térdre rogyjanak és úgy kérjenek bocsánatot azért, amit tesznek” (Dragomán, 442.) 42 „A vonat egy nagy gyártelep mellett megy el, mögötte a dombon épülő blokknegyed, a blokkok között még ott
állnak a toronydaruk, de az ablakok mögött mintha nagy tüzek lobognának. Nagymama kinéz, azt mondja, ez az
új vasgyári negyed (...). Hideg van, a peronon csak egy lámpa ég, ahol a felüljáró átvezet a sínek között. A bőröndöt
nehéz felcipelni a síkos vaslépcsőn, Nagymama segít. Ahogy felérünk, átnézek a rácsokon. Az állomás nagyon
nagy, tizenöt vagy még annál is több vágányon állnak rajta a tehervonatok. (...) Átmegyünk a pályaudvar épületén,
a kijárat fölött a nagy óráról hiányoznak a mutatók, mielőtt kilépünk, az új órámra nézek, látom, hogy hét perc
múlva lesz éjfél” (Dragomán, 37.)
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are filled with the fur’s smell. Mother’s old coat pops into my head, which she has never worn,
I remember a word: naphthalene. I go to sleep with this word on my tongue.”43
The presence of the motifs, which form a motif network in the novel, allows the creation of
the magical space. The recurrent ants, flour, drawing, running, trees, foxes and the bonfire are
important metaphors of the text. The fox, appearing on the cover, has a central role in the novel,
the foxes, released from their cages, symbolize people freed from dictatorship.
Another device of mythicising is the child narrator, whose bitter experience, the loss of her
parents defines the entire rest of the novel, everything is correlated to this, even the time of the
story is measured compared to this. The child that gradually marvels on the world and its
meretriciousness, symbolizes a writer generation that lived through the everyday life during the
dictatorship in the 1970s and ‘80s as children in Eastern Europe.
The motifs that appear in the novel are interpreted by the child through her own world view,
as a constant absence of the parents, the roles determined to replace them, the familiar, social
and collective system lies, physical aggression, vulnerability, the fear it causes and also,
interdependence, or even resignation.
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